A Game Of Chance

The most popular pastime in Britain is a kind of gambling. There are no horses involved ... no greyhounds or boxers; no specialized knowledge is required; it is purely and simply a matter of chance.

The name of the game is bingo and it is played by 6 million people in 1,600 clubs throughout the country.

This is not the world of roulette tables and top-hatted Casino doormen. The bingo halls are generally converted cinemas in working class high streets.

85 per cent of the players are women and their average age is about 52. Family fortunes are not lost. Most of the women spend no more than five pounds a week, but the prizes can run into several thousand pounds.

The real attraction of the game is probably the companionship it provides. For lonely housewives and elderly people the bingo club is a lively, warm place to go in winter.

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Magistrates Courts

Most citizens never appear before a judge. If they have a brush with the law, they are more likely to find themselves in a magistrates' court.

The atmosphere there is far less formal and intimidating than a law court. There are no wigs, no gowns, no jurry, and often no lawyers.

The magistrates are not usually professionals. They are called Justices of the Peace (JP) and are appointed on the advice of a local committee,and they generally sit in their courts once a week. In big towns, however, the magistrates' courts operate every day, and the magistrate is a professional lawyer.

About two-thirds of the convictions in a magistrates' court are for traffic offences. Next come revenue offences (mainly failure to take out licences for dogs and cars), then drunkeness, and assault.

Magistrates sit in in twos or threes, with a professional clerk to advise them on points of law. In modern times this has reduced the risk of eccentric decisions.

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Innocent Until Proved Guilty

Law Courts

Film makers love the law courts. They are perfect dramatic setting. The scenery is impressive, the costumes are stylish, and there is suspense.

The performers are the two barriseters (Counsel for the defence and Counsel for the prosecution), the prisoner, the judge and the twelve members of the jury.

The Counsel for the prosecution sets out what he intends to prove. Then he calls his witnesses and they give their evidence.

The barrister defending the prisoner then cross-examines the witnesses. His intention is to establish his client's innocence. Finally, the counsel for the prosecution re-examines the witnesses in order to prove his case.

The whole procudure is repeated in with the defence witnesses.

If the prisoner has pleaded 'not guilty' he is assumed to beinnpcent until he contrary is proved. The jury has to decide on one thing only - the moment of suspense in courtroom films - whether the prisoner is guilty or not.

It is left to the judge to decide on the punishment.

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Birthday Cake

A Birthday cake is more than just something good to eat.

At a flamboyant young Englishman'a birthday a giant cake was wheeled into the room on a trolley. Then, as all his friends began to sing 'Happy birtday to you...' the top of the cake burst open and a beautiful girl rose from the icing holding a foaming bottle of champagne.

A Chicago gangster in the twenties did not have such benevolent friends. When the trolley was wheeled in, a man with a machine gun burst out of the cake.

But birtday cakes are not usually so extravagant. Traditionally they are iced and have candles on them - one for every year. However, there comes a time when there is either no room for the candles, or people just prefer not to count them.

'A diplomat', a fomous poet once said. 'is a man who always remembers a woman's birthday but never remembers her age.'

When it is someone's birthday, children give him the 'bumps'. He is thrown in the air and bumped on the ground, once for every year - and once for 'luck'. And his friends sing their own words to the traditional birtday song:

'Happy Birthday to you,

Squashed tomatoes and stew,

I saw a fat monkey

And I thought it was you!'

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Kew Gardens

Not many people go to Kew for the right reason. You can tell the ones who do. They look serious and enquiring, and keep writing things down in notebooks.

Most people go to Kew simply because it is an extraordinarily beautiful place, not because they are serious botanists.

The Royal Botanical Gardens at Kew are a 25 minute tube ride from the centre of London. They cover 300 acres and contain the largest collection of living plants in the world, more than 45,000 species.

Groups of friends picnic on the deep green lawns at the foot of exotic trees and sumptuous rhododendron bushes, watching ducks and swans on the placeful lake.

There are stunningly beautiful glasshouses. There is an eighteenth century orangery. And there is a Chinese pagoda, built in 1761, which is 50 metres high.

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The King's Right Arm

In 1606 William the Conqueror put an arrow in King Harold's eye, and became the King of England.

The first thing he wanted to do was to take stock of his new acquisition. But when he started asking questions, nobody knew the answers. England in the 11th century was a pretty disorganized palace.

It was too much for William's sense of order. With Gallic efficiency and logic he set about recording the details of every town, village, building and inhabitant of the country. The information was to be kept until the end of the world! He called it the Domesday Book, and it still exists.

When William died in 1100, his grandson, Henry I continued the task of organizing the orderless English. He reformed the law, and he also addressed himself to the problem of measurements.

Everything was measured in yards, feet and inches. An inch was always a twelfth of a foot. And a yard was always three feet. But some people had big feet and some had small feet.

King Henry's right arm was exactly three times as long as his foot. So King Henry's right arm became the standard measurement for a yard.

For the Romans, a mile was a thousand paces-the Romans were also logical and efficent. The English mile is exactly 1,760 times the length of King Henry's right arm.

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Lions On The Lawn

It's an expensive business being rich in England -as the Duke of Bedford and The Marquess of Bath will tel you.

The Duke of Bedford has got one of the most impressive private art collections in the world. Apart from paintings by Rembrandt, Canaletto, Van Dyck and Gainsborough he has superb pieces of antique furniture, silver, and an amazing dinner service which the King of France gave to one of his ancestors.

He keeps it all in a magnificent house called Woburn Abbey, 70 km north of London.

The Marquess of Bath keeps his treasures in a 400 year old place in the west of England - Longleat House.

They have both had to face the same problem: a fine work of art is worth nothing, unless you are prepared to sell it - in other words, you can't have your cake and eat it!

In order to pay for the upkeep of thir family homes (and to keep the taxman happy) they have both opened them to the public - and they have both done it in style. There are restaurants and minaature railways, pubs, gift shops, and amusement arcades.

The idea of Space Invaders amongst the antiques has caused many an eyebrow to be raised. But aristocratic eyes positively popped when the Duke and the Marquess turned their respective gardens into Safari Parks.

Now zebras, giraffes and tigers stroll in the heart of the English countryside. Dolphins leap, the children ride on camels. Visitors are warned not to get out of their car in case they get eaten by lions.

The lions on the lawn are also usefull for keeing burglars away from the Van Dycks and the Rembrandts.

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The Emerald Isle

Ireland is the 'Emerald Isle'. The deep green of the rolling Irish countryside has to be seen to be believed.

And green is te colour of the national emblem - the humble shamrock, which Irishmen, from Dublin to Chicago, wear proudly in their buttonholes on St Patrick's day (March 17th).

St Patrick was actually a Scotsman. His father was a wealthy British magistrate under the Romans in the 4th century.

As a boy, Patrick was captured by Irish raiders and carried over the sea. They sold him as a slave to a Northern Irish chieftain.

Patrick looked after his master's cattle on the mountains and in the wood. Six cold, wet winters of slavery concentrated his mind on religious matters. He dreamed of escape and of preaching Christianity to the heathens.

He made his way to France, where he became the pupil of St Martin of Tours - the soldier saint who gave half his jewelled cloak to a beggar. Then, at the age of thirty, he returned to Ireland as a missionary.

Many legends grew up around St Patrick. One is that he drove all the smakes from Ireland. Another is that he explained the Trinity by comparing it to the three leaves of the shamrock.

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A Rip-Off

In some restaurants (not the best) the waiter gives you your bill but he does not take your money. You pay at the cash desk on your way out.

This way the management can be sure that nobody slips out while the waiter's back is turned - without paying.

But these restaurants have had to find ways of preventing a new trick.

A penniless student goes in and orders a meal. He spares no expense asking for soup, a starter, a main course, dessert, cheese - whatever takes his fancy.

As he nears the end of his meal, another student comes in and sits at this table. He orders a coffee and reads a book. The two students are apparently complete strangers. When the bills come they exchange them surreptitiously. The first student leaves the restaurant and pays for the coffee as he passes the cash desk.

A few minutes later, this second student picks up the bill for the meal and exclaims that he has only had a coffee. Of course he only pays for the coffee that he had.

He then joins his friend round the corner, and together they look for another restaurant.

That way they both get a meal.

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The Welsh

In the year 1415 a welsh soldier took a Londoner by the collar and forced him to eat a raw leek.

The Londoner had been mocking his Welch accent and insulting his national emblem, the leek.

The Welsh today are as proud of their language and their national emblem as they were four hundred years ago when Shakespeare put this scene into his patriotic drama, King Henry V.

But it cannot be denied that the Welsh language and the Welsh accent (when they speak English) are both more beutiful than their national emblem. In fact, nowadays, they usually wear a daffodil, not a leek, on the day of their patron saint, St. David.

St David is called St. Dewi in Welsh. His day is March 1st, but little is known about him except that he probably died in the year 601 AD. According to a mediaeval history book, he was born in 458 AD - which means he was 143 years old when he died!

Apart from a long life he also had a very loud voice. Another mediaeval history book claims that he was made Archbishop of Wales because he was the only bishop who could make himself heard at the back of a large congregation.

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